The Marvelous Flash Mob
by TheRealEvanSG
Summary: A world of heroic rich people, radioactivated superpowers, and an all-too-literal usage of the phrase "to dust you shall return"... Evan wants none of it. Unfortunately, life isn't so giving. [Marvel Self-Insert]
1. I Vow to Never Use Magic Mushrooms

Chapter 1: In Which I Make a Solemn Vow to Never Use Magic Mushrooms

My adventure began with the most mind-boggingly boring day at work ever.

It was a Thursday night and not many people wanted to come to a gas station convenience store, it seemed. I stood behind the counter pouting and tapping my foot restlessly to the (goddamn horrible) country music issuing softly from the speakers in the ceiling. I stared out the window to the dark intersection outside the store.

A minute passed. A few cars pulled up to and turned at the intersection. None of them came into our parking lot.

I groaned.

"Is anyone going to fucking shop here so I can fucking _do something_?" I groaned loudly and wearily, dragging my hand down my face dramatically.

"It's eight-thirty on a Thursday night at Circle K," my coworker deadpanned. I glanced over to see him unabashedly texting on his phone, regardless of the cameras overhead and the paper note clamped to the counter that warned against using phones on-shift except for emergencies. Anthony Driar, twenty-two years old, stood taller than me by just a hair. He had fair skin like mine but his arms had lots of freckles, his nose was longer, and he looked somewhat like a weasel. He always told people exactly what he thought of them. "No one's coming," he said with a bland expression.

I frowned and chewed at a fingernail for lack of anything else to do. "Who are you texting?"

"My secret mistress whom I sleep with behind my wife's back," Anthony said with a roll of his eyes. I snorted, raising an eyebrow. "My wife. She's pregnant and has been bitchier than usual."

"What's she want?" I wondered. It was more interesting than literally anything else going on at the moment, anyway.

"Hell if I know."

It was my turn to roll my eyes now. "Come on, you don't even know what she's talking about? It's your wife, man. You're supposed to know this shit."

"She's been jumping from one thing to the next," Anthony argued. "Not my fault."

"Whatever, dude." I rolled my eyes and leaned back against the counter. I waited for something else to happen. Outside, a person pulled into the parking lot, but they only stopped at the gas tank and started pumping gas. I groaned, "God, there's literally nothing for us to do."

Anthony rolled his eyes a second time and checked the time on his iPhone. "Why don't you go check the trash outside then?"

"Sure, sure," I sighed, even though I already knew the six cans outside weren't full enough to be taken out. Rolling down the sleeves of my long-sleeved, red work shirt, I grabbed a neon orange safety vest and shrugged it on. Then I stepped across the scuffed-up floor, emerged from behind the counter, and pushed the doors open, heat from my hands transferring to the cold door.

I stepped out into the parking lot. It was semi-lit, the gas pumps being the brightest part, but still relatively safe. We were on the outskirts of town, a short ways away from the railroad tracks, and rarely had any incidents. There was one time that a homeless person had decided the garbage dumpsters would make a good sleeping spot, but that could hardly have been considered dangerous. The most harrowing this Circle K got was when my coworker and an old, bald guy got in a heated debate over the price tags of a Reese's bar.

It was chilly out here, at night during early October in Ohio. I shivered and vaguely wished I'd thought to bring my jacket. Sadly, I'd left that on my floor in my bedroom at home, alongside half of the rest of the clothes I owned. Cursing my lack of foresight, I hugged as much of my own body heat in to myself as I could while I checked the first trash can. As I thought, empty. The second was also empty. The third was, lord of all surprises, empty. The rest sat across the parking lot, with the gas pumps.

I rolled my eyes and sighed.

What a waste of time.

Grumbling to myself, I ran a hand through my chocolate-colored hair which lay neatly parted to the right, and stepped onto the asphalt. I didn't notice the eerie light blue light that sparked around my dark jeans as I did so.

I held back a yawn as I reached the gas pump area. I'd gotten bad sleep the previous night; I hadn't been able to fall asleep until two o'clock thanks to my dog waking up and barking. This was annoying since it meant I'd nearly been late to college classes this morning.

I could be doing _literally anything_ right now, I told myself with a bite of annoyance as I checked the next trash can. Instead, I was boring my ass off at a local gas station near a town in The Middle of Nowhere, Ohio: the most goddamn nothing you've ever seen!

God, how I wished I was back on Exchange to Brazil. Now that, _that_ had been amazing.

I swept away to the next trash can and bent down to peer into it.

I squinted. Was that… blue light?

I rubbed my eyes and looked again. Nothing. I frowned. Maybe I was more sleep-deprived than I thought. Had I gone to bed later than two? It had happened before. There'd been days where I'd stayed up past _four_. Those had been pretty rough. Had I stayed up that late and not realized it?

I yawned again. Man, all this thought about sleep was making me sleepy. How long was my shift again? Shit, ten o'clock, wasn't it? I did some quick mental math. I wouldn't be getting to bed until eleven, granting myself enough time to get home, get dinner, and clean up and everything. And I had an essay due for tomorrow that I still had only gotten half complete.

In other words, fuck my life.

I swear I'm only this negative when I'm bored and tired as hell.

Not bothering to hold back a yawn when I felt it coming this time, I blearily rubbed my eyes and continued to the next trash can. That one had been half-full; I'd have to empty it and change the trash bags. Yaaaay. Something to do.

As my foot started to descend to the asphalt, time seemed to slow down. A buzzing so low I hadn't noticed it before heightened, and I winced and flinched away from the sound. A suspiciously ozone-like smell filled the brisk air. What was going on? I gritted my teeth…

My foot landed on the asphalt, and as I moved to take another step, the parking lot _glowed_.

A mysterious, invisible force suddenly grabbed hold of my entire body, and before I quite knew what was happening, _something_ yanked me backwards with incredible force. A terrified, confused shout erupted from my throat at the sheer suddenness of everything. The world around me melted into a myriad of color.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAARGH!" I cried out, incredible speed I moved at forcing tears out of my eyes. Wind buffeted my hair, and I desperately clawed at the space around me, searching for something, _anything_ , to grasp onto to slow my… what could I even call it? I had no idea. What was happening!?

Pain split my back apart and my movement slowed enough for me to see where I was. And what I saw confused me even further. I had apparently crashed into the back of a… humongous tower? That looked nothing like any tower I'd ever seen pictures of and swirled with purple, magical light? The fuck? Eliciting a startled yell from me, the crazy, mysterious force yanked me backwards again, and the world again became color until more pain erupted as I crashed into something new and I slowed down enough to spot what looked like a swamp with… _DINOSAURS_. Okay seriously, what!? Had someone given me some kind of drug without me realizing it!?

The force yanked me back again. As the world again became a strobe-like flashing of colors, I felt a disgusting, sick sensation fill my throat. I gagged and desperately fought to keep it down. At the same time, electric whispers of pain spread throughout my body. Fear washed over me. I needed someone, anyone, to get me out of this!

"Help!" I croaked as my head bounced off something and spots danced before my eyes. For just a second, I glimpsed an umbrella (which I must've collided with) ripped out of sand on a beach, and me flying over water; then the force pulled me back again.

The pain grew. It was like needles stabbing into me now, into every part of my body. I couldn't help but scream in agony. A skyscraper momentarily filtered into view amidst the constant stream of color; a sand dune in a desert; a red rock in a wasteland with a sickly orange sky; a meteorite in space.

By now I was in sheer agony. Every inch of me felt as though it was being continuously ripped apart and stitched back to the rest. I looked up and suddenly, I had the curious sensation that I was staring directly back at my own terrified face, and then the moment was over and it was back in the endless rainbow river of agony.

"Please!" I gasped weakly, my voice hoarse from screaming. "Somebody!"

My body hummed with agony. I blinked, and felt the strangest sensation of someone beside me, but the next second it was gone again.

" _Anybody_!"

I tumbled ever backwards, slammed into what appeared to be a brilliant cavern of crystals emitting a mystic glow, then returned to my new torture.

My pain suddenly shot up, and this time it felt like there were three people with me; and then just me.

"HEEEEELP!"

The desperate shout flew away as I flew backwards to an unknown destination.

One thing solidified itself in my head: If I ever survived this and stooped to the point where I'd try drugs, I absolutely was not, under _any circumstances_ , taking any psychedelics.

* * *

When a flash of light blue energy lit up the mountainside of the Alps, just beneath an abandoned Nazi base, a man and his daughter who happened to be out gathering wood for their fire in their log cabin paused and stared at it… and consequently, the young man who flew out of the sky. Identical shouts of surprise rose from their throats as the teen, clearly unconscious, tumbled unceremoniously to the mountainside and began rolling down the snow. He was of medium height and appeared American, with windblown chocolate hair and fair skin. Dressed only in a red shirt with a logo reading _Circle K_ , dark blue jeans, and gray tennis shoes, as well as a name tag which had the word _Evan_ on it, he clearly was a stranger to these lands.

Father and daughter's eyes went wide. For several moments, neither of them moved. Evan rolled to a stop. He didn't move.

" _Oh my god_ ," the daughter, nineteen years old and blonde, gasped in her native German. " _He could be dead!_ " Unsure of what had just occurred but fearful for the stranger's life, she rushed forward across the snow, dropping a small bundle of wood that had been in her arms.

" _Sofia!"_ her father shouted, jolted out of his stupor by her action. He chased after her, although he kept hold of the wood he'd gathered so far. " _Sofia, wait! What if he's something like… the Hulk! Or some super-soldier like Captain America? He came from nowhere! He could be dangerous!"_

Sofia had reached Evan by now. She knelt on the ground and checked his pulse. " _He's alive_ ," she reported, relieved. It would've been scary to have found a dead person. _"But his pulse is… very strange. It's erratic… jumping all over the place. And he seems to be… unconscious._ " looked up at her father, who had reached her and was slowing to a slop. " _We have to get him to a doctor. What if he has bad injuries? Or some health problem?_ "

Sofia's dad scoffed. " _And say what? Some stupid American fell out of the sky in the Alps?_ "

" _Dad! He could die out here!_ "

 _"...Fine,"_ her father relented. " _But we're taking him home, not to a doctor. No one would believe us if we told them how we found him. Let your mother fix him up._ "

* * *

"Sir! Sir!"

"What is it?"

"We have massive energy readings unlike almost anything we've seen before, a short way away from where Johann Schmidt's old laboratory used to be!"

"...Unlike _almost_ anything?"

"Yes, sir! There have only been a few other instances of energy readings this massive and erratic, and those have been at that same laboratory during Schmidt's experiments with other universes using the Tesseract!"

"Hm. The Dimensional Soldier experiments… Tell Coulson to send Black Widow to Germany. We need information on this."

"But isn't she tracking Bru―"

" _Now._ "

"Yes, Mr. Nick Fury, sir!"

* * *

When I woke up, my body still hurt really bad, but not nearly as bad as it had when the sheer pain caused me to black out. I felt hot and sweaty but at the same time, my hands were clammy and shivering. I was also super exhausted. I groaned and rolled around on the soft mattress, wishing I could just fall asleep again.

Someone, a female voice judging from the high-pitched quality, shouted something urgently in German. A door groaned open, and footsteps echoed against what sounded like a wooden floor. I opened my eyes wearily. Where was I that had people who spoke German? I lived in rural Ohio. I only knew a handful of people who even spoke _Spanish_ , who weren't undocumented Guatemalans and Mexicans, anyway. And there were a lot less of them lately since that fucking ICE raided the local ham factory.

The sight of a bedroom in a log cabin, or at least that's what I assumed it to be, with a snowy mountain outside the window on the wall next to me made me go still with shock. What the hell? It was still early October. Not even Ohio with its crazy, messed-up and hormonal weather patterns received snowfall this early.

Oh, and how had I gotten on top of a _mountain?_

With wide eyes, I hurriedly scanned the room, my heart pounding as I did so. A blonde and who I guessed was her equally blond father watched me with some surprise. The girl, who looked about my age, smiled.

"You're finally awake!" she said in English, her accent thickly German. She was fairly cute, and wore a pale yellow turtleneck sweater that went well with her hair. She also had a pair of blue jeans and thick wool socks. "We were beginning to think you'd never wake up and that we'd have to take you to the nearest hospital." She frowned at the older man. "Which is what we should've done in the first place, _papa_." She spoke this last word accusingly.

The old man gave a great harrumph and frowned at her. "As I said before, Sofia, who would've believed us if we told them a young man appeared in the sky from nowhere and fell?"

I felt dizzy all of a sudden. Shit, that _hadn't_ been just a dream after all?

"Where am I?" I croaked. My mouth was dry and the roof of my mouth felt rough and sore. "What day is it?"

They exchanged glances. "You're in the Alps, in Germany," the blonde―Sofia―said softly, gently. "It's the second of June."

The second of June!? My eyes widened as big as saucers. "What the hell? That's not possible. Last night was October the fourth. How long was I out!?"

The girl stared with wide eyes, clearly taken aback by statement. "O-only about a day," she stammered. "Look, there's a calendar right there behind you, on the wall―check."

My head swiveled around to look over my shoulder. Sure enough, a calendar hung there flipped to June, the days marked off with red x's until the second. Certain I had to be seeing things, I rechecked the month. Nope, it was definitely Jun… Wait! Aha! It said _June 2011_!

"You guys need to get a new calendar," I deadpanned. "This is off by seven years."

Her father furrowed his brow. "No it's not," he said equally flatly. He pointed to the year. "It's 2011, just like it says." His English was rougher than his daughter's, but still fairly clear for a foreigner.

"What?" I gave a dry laugh. "Come on, man, you can't expect me to believe that. Don't pull my strings. It's not June or 2011, you're just trying to screw with me. It's definitely at the very least the fifth of October, 2018."

"Twenty _eighteen?_ " Sofia gasped. "Don't be stupid. It's definitely not. Come here, I'll show you the morning newspaper."

I shakily got up from their bed. A checkered blue-and-white blanket and sky blue sheets fell from me as I did so. I followed her to the open door on the far wall of the bedroom, past a desk and bureau. We emerged out into a hall with a railing looking out onto a staircase, to which we walked. After descending it, we found ourselves in the center of a large, cozy living room and kitchen combination.

On the right, one large couch and two love chairs sat around a mahogany coffee table, which in turn sat in front of a crackling fireplace. A Sony TV which played the news sat on a marble ridge above the fireplace. Underneath these was a large black, red, and gold rug with diamond patterns in it. A similarly styled rug, except in dark blue, green, and white, lay on the landing of the staircase. Bookcases with well-used books as well as movies and games lay along the walls when there weren't windows looking out onto the snowy landscape, or framed photos (some of which had Sofia and her father).

Somewhat separated from the living room side by the staircase and the walls on either side of it was the kitchen to the left. It was a clean, orderly kitchen with everything you'd expect to find in one; refrigerator, oven, microwave, counter, sink, a cutting board, cupboards; the works. Above the sink, another window stared out over the mountain. It was the only one in the kitchen save for a small square one to the right of the refrigerator/freezer combo. A low table sat in the kitchen, big enough for about three people but no more. The larger table was located in the living room, behind the couches.

Sofia pointed to a newspaper which lay on the small kitchen table. A cup of coffee sat next to it, and it lay opened; I assumed either Sofia or her father had been reading it prior to me regaining consciousness. "See? Check the date."

I moved to it and checked the date while her father clopped down the stairs behind us.

I choked.

Sure enough, it said June 2nd, 2011.

What the hell?

That was when the newspaper's headline caught my eye: **_IRON MAN, WAR MACHINE, AND HAPPY HOGAN DESTROY DRONE ARMY_. **A picture of Robert Downey Jr. standing beside the Iron Man suit was printed right in the top middle.

What the _fucking hell_?

"Sofia," I said, feeling very, very dizzy, "you guys may need to take me to the hospital after all."

Barely a second after I said this, I toppled backward in a faint from pure shock. After all, it wasn't just June 2nd, 2011.

It was June 2nd, 2011 in the _MCU_.


	2. I Vow to Never Join the Avengers

Chapter 2: In Which I Make a Solemn Vow to Never Become an Avenger

When I woke up for the second time, I finally felt normal again. My body wasn't sickly hot and I didn't even have a remnant of my former pain. Although now that I thought about it, my back still felt sore and tender in a few spots. My mouth did feel really dry, though. I needed water _now_. Groaning from the curious exhaustion of oversleeping, I opened my eyes and blinked as I saw the log cabin's roof and wall.

Well. I hadn't dreamt it all up in some kind of feverish hallucination, at least.

Shit. I was kind of hoping I had.

"Good, you're awake again," a voice that sounded somewhat like Sofia's but more mature said kindly. I glanced to the right, towards the rest of the bedroom, to see an older woman, probably in her early forties, smiling. She smirked. "I've been keeping watch over you and tending to you while you slept. You had some pretty nasty cuts, gashes, and bruises when Sofia and Stefan found you. I'm a practicing nurse, however―studied in America―so I was able to fix them up fairly well. They should fully heal." She sighed and shook her head. "I still agree with my daughter, though: Stefan should've taken you to the hospital."

"Thanks," I said weakly, put off by how she looked a little bit like my mother, strangely enough. "Your English is very good." It was. I barely even heard an accent.

The woman, who must've been Sofia's mom, smiled widely. "Thank you. I have studied English for many years. I even lived in America for several years while studying, and several more past that. It's a very beautiful country."

"Uh. Thanks. How do you know I'm American?"

She snorted. "You're wearing a Circle K shirt. I used to go to a local one all the time. Sofia recognized it as well since we stopped at a few while on vacation in America several years ago." She raised an eyebrow. "Although speaking of you… Sofia mentioned that the last time you woke up, you said it should be October in 2018."

I winced. "Uh. Yeah. Um… see, about that…"

"Are you a time traveler?" the older woman queried bluntly.

I stared at her. Had she just said that like she whole-heartedly believed it?

Sofia's mom, reading my expression, shrugged. "America has been very, ah, strange lately. Iron Man, the Hulk, and now reports of Norse gods fighting in New Mexico… Seems there's all kinds of crazy popping up each day. A time traveler seems fairly tame compared to that." She rubbed her head sheepishly. "Also, I may have become a Doctor Who fan when I went to America…"

I slumped my head in defeat. "No, no, I'm not a time traveler. Not on purpose, at least… I was just minding my own business at work, and the next thing I know, something grabs onto me and I'm suddenly shooting backwards through some kind of whirlwind of color, and then here I am, seven years in the past." And in a totally different alternate universe, I added in my head.

She frowned. "Damn. I was really hoping you were one."

I decided I liked this woman.

Anyway, now that that little bit of exposition was over, I realized I really needed a place to stay. But that was going to be a bit difficult. I had nothing here; no job, no money, no _life_ at all, and I couldn't understand the language at all.

Still, I didn't want to just freeload off of these German strangers. They'd been kind enough to help me out, but that didn't justify intruding in their home past that.

"Do you have any place to stay?" the woman asked, breaking the momentary silence caused by my internal dilemma.

I blinked up in surprise. Well. That was coincidental.

"No…" I admitted with an awkward tremor. "Uh… American from 2018, and all."

Her eyes softened. "Well, then, that's an issue. Hm… you can stay in the guest bedroom until you're able to get a place of your own, if you like. We can help get you set up with all the necessary things. We have some house rules you'll have to follow, though, and you'll have to get a job. We're not kind enough to just let a stranger stay in our house for free."

Yeah. Pretty much exactly what I tho―

Wait, did she say she'd actually _let me stay_?

"But… I'm a total stranger," I pointed out, eyes wide. "Why would you let me stay?"

"Because while you may indeed be a total stranger, you have no means of getting by on your own. You don't even have the proper documentation to be here legally. You have nowhere to turn to. Also, because I'm a mother and I can't help but feel mothery about your situation. Also also, because being a practicing nurse means that I know exactly where to hit you to make it hurt the worst should you turn out to be an asshole."

Yep. I definitely liked this woman.

I also wondered if I should tell her that mothery wasn't an actual word.

...Point out errors in the speech of the woman who was currently offering me boarding and three meals a day was likely not the best course of action.

"I accept your offer," I said graciously, "Mrs…. uh…"

"Mrs. Mayer," she supplied. She reached out to shake my hand. "Petra Mayer."

I glanced around the bedroom. "By the way, where's your husband and daughter?"

"My husband is at his work at the steel plant in town," she explained. "I sent my daughter out to get groceries. We're having stew tonight."

...Okay, this was officially awesome.

~o~

Several Weeks Later

Now that things had calmed down a bit, the full implications of the situation that I was in struck me one by one.

First, the possibility that unless I could get my hands on an Infinity Stone or maybe an Ant-Man suit, depending on whatever weird reality-bending physics existed at the quantum realm level, I might never return to my old life lodged in my head as I sat at my third dinner with the Mayers. I could possibly never see my family again… although in the case of my mom, that admittedly wasn't too big of an issue. I might never see my work, college, or Exchange friends again. This was more of an issue, and left me pretty messed up for several days.

A surf through the web a week later brought a second shocking revelation to me: most of my favorite series weren't even _out_ yet. _Hunter x Hunter_ wouldn't be releasing its first episode for several months still. _JoJo's Bizarre Adventure_ wouldn't be releasing _its_ first episode for another whole year. And hell, _My Hero Academia_ wouldn't even be airing its first _manga chapter_ until 2014! As a self-proclaimed nerd, this affected me greatly, especially the inability to go on YouTube and listen to their OPs/OSTs.

...At least I could become the single best anime "theorist" on YouTube.

...Huh.

That thought led me to starting up a new YouTube channel using one of the Mayers' computers, which thanks to the better technology in this timeline, were actually a lot better than the computers from my world's 2018. I ended up making videos on the side while I searched for a job at the closest town, Himmelstein, which was a few miles down the mountain from the log cabin.

Surprisingly, it didn't take me long to get a job working part-time at Stefan's plant. Apparently having connections to Stefan and Petra Mayer meant a lot with the locals. I was really damn lucky to have been picked up by the family. Work at the plant was rather rougher than I was used to, but I did make some decent pay, so that was something.

The plant was, as Petra had mentioned, a steel plant. I worked on the floor as a general laborer. I couldn't understand anything my boss or coworkers said to me except for some who spoke English, but luckily Stefan translated for me. As for why I was American, the Mayers simply said that I was probably a tourist who had lost his memory in an accident, and that I was staying with them until I got it back. This was actually the story they used to get me legal passage here, and I saw later that it had made it to the news.

It was pretty easy to fake, really. The government bought it, at least.

There was still some legal stuff we had to mess with, but luckily Sofia's older cousin was studying to be a lawyer and helped us out with a lot of it. Lord knows I wouldn't even begin to describe it even if I spoke German. I was basically just handed a lot of forms to sign, and the Mayers talked with a lot of people on both the phone and in person, and shit got done.

~o~

The next unplanned incident in my life occurred at the steel plant.

I was talking with a buddy of mine, Ernst, as we moved some packages of supplies that had been shipped in. Ernst, one of the workers who actually spoke my lingo, was complaining about his brother.

"My parents found Frank digging through their old sock drawer," Ernst told me, grunting as he pushed a dolly with crates beside me. His load looked heavier than mine. Ernst was bigger than me by at least a hundred pounds, all of it muscle, after all. If he was grunting, shit was heavy, even on a dolly. He usually had slickly combed hair, but it often got messed up while on the floor.

"No shit," I said, pushing my load around someone who was checking pipes.

Ernst's honest blue eyes flashed with anger. "Yeah. The doped up dickhead was stealing from their vacation savings. He looked like a deer caught in the headlights when they came home to find him there, taking a big old wad of money out of the envelope."

I gazed up and at the wall to our left past Ernst, thinking about what it would be like to be in that situation. "Kinda sad, really."

"Yeah," my buddy agreed, tone dropping as his anger was replaced with sympathy. "Frank picked the wrong friends, you know? And they just… fucked him up. Chewed him out and spat him on the sidewalk. He became one of 'em, and he just… was never right in the head. Not after he took that first shot of dope." He sighed and picked up his pace, pulling ahead of me. "Come on, let's not talk about that piece o' shit any longer. Let's get these to where they need to go and get back on the floor."

On our right, the rest of the factory was at work on the floor. To the left, some crates and steel drums had been stacked. As my eyes casually took it in, I noticed that a drum about a couple feet from us, placed too close to the edge of the crate beneath it, started to edge off. My eyes widened. Ernst, being closest to the wall, was in the most danger; he'd certainly be hit. And since he'd picked up speed, he was too far from me to reach him.

"Hey, look out!" I shouted as the steel drum fell. I desperately dashed forward, reaching out, but it would be too late!

That was when a strange, foreign energy left my body, and to my utter shock, I saw a clone of myself suddenly in front and to the left of me, grabbing Ernst's bigger, more muscular body by his black shirt and yanking him backward just in time to avoid the steel drum. It crashed into his dolly instead. A couple of the crates sitting on it broke, but nobody was harmed.

The metallic verberation and the shattering of wood seemed to echo across the factory. Workers suddenly rushed to us, all chattering worriedly in German.

I stood in shock.

What had just…?

Had a _clone of me_ just saved Ernst?

I looked again, but there was no clone; just Ernst sitting with a disturbing pallor on the cold factory floor.

He looked up at me with wide eyes. "Evan… you just saved my life. Or at least saved me from some really bad injuries."

"What?" I croaked. "But… you were too far ahead…"

That couldn't have been me… but that couldn't have been a clone of me either. That was fucking ridiculous. I had to have been seeing things.

 _As ridiculous as getting transported to the MCU?_ a little voice in my head questioned.

 _YES,_ I answered it flatly.

 _Fair point_ , the voice in my head conceded.

I really hoped I wasn't going crazy. But a very terrified looking Ernst was giving me a grateful hug all of a sudden and telling me that I was the best friend a guy could have. So what exactly was going on here?

That evening, I sat on my bed staring at my hands. My skin prickled with a curious sensation. I wasn't sure whether it was fear or anticipation. Probably both. After all… if I really had somehow created a clone of myself back there… I was about to try and find out.

I closed my eyes, trying to remember that feeling that had fallen over me before the steel drum had hit Ernst.

Like some weird, hot energy leaving my body…

I opened my eyes. Nada. I wasn't sure whether I should be happy or disappointed.

After a moment of consideration and thinking, I tried again.

And quite suddenly, I stared right at myself without any mirror or reflection or anything. It was a real, living, breathing copy of myself standing before me, exactly the same as me. My breath caught in my throat as a mix of emotions confused my mind.

"Hey boss," the other me told myself. "Took you long enough." He blinked as he noticed the dumbfounded state I was in. "...You gonna say something?"

"...I have superpowers." I gaped, my body trembling. "I have clone powers in a world of comic book superheroes."

"Yup." My clone nodded sagely. "About sums it up. Oh, we can transform to anything you want though, too."

"...Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck."

...While on the one hand, it was INCREDIBLE to have superpowers… on the other hand, this was a universe based on a comic series. Being a superhuman in such a world was already bad enough? But having clone powers?

"Oh, don't worry, boss. We won't turn on you like those shitty clones in all the movies and comics. We're cooler than that."

...Okay, my life was _slightly_ less fucked, but still.

I fixed a solid glare on my clone. "Okay, listen up. We're not going to do anything the least bit superhero-ish, got it?"

The clone pouted. "Awww. Come on, boss. You know it'd be fun!"

" _We'd get our asses whupped!_ "

"Fair point, fair point," the Other Me agreed. "Counterpoint: our asses have a 50-50 chance of getting _turned to dust_ if we don't do something anyway."

"Fair point, fair point," I said sarcastically. "Counterpoint: this kind of shit never goes well for people like us. No heroics. At all. We lay low, maybe use this to our advantage a bit, but no. Heroics. We do not want Nick Fury to find us, or _god fucking forbid_ HYDRA. Let no one know that I have clones."

The clone groaned. "Fiiiine, boss. You're boring. But I guess I already knew that."

"Oi! ...Hold on, did you just say my clones can transform?"

The Other Me nodded, blinking. "Yup."

"...Like, into _anything_? Any object? Any..." I paused and my mind jumped to… stranger places. I blushed a little. "Other body types?"

"...I see where you're going with this. Yes. Yes we can. And I, for one, have absolutely no objections."

Well.

I may have misjudged things. This could be really fun after all. ...I was still putting my foot down on the heroics thing though.


	3. Clones Are Good For Making Money

Chapter 3: In Which Clones Are Good For Making Money

A eulogy on food:

Food is amazing. Food is wonderful. Food is love, food is life. Wars are fought over food; nations rise and fall because of it. It caters to all of our natural senses, eliciting desire for it from all five. It makes people happy and it brings people together. Food is good.

And Petra Mayer's food is the fucking goat.

I wolfed down the french toast she'd put on my plate like I was a starving boi. Working in the steel plant was tough, extremely physical work, and I found myself needing tons of energy lately. Luckily, Petra's cooking more than provided. She liked to use tons of fruit and vegetables in her dishes, and it always turned out amazing. Take today's breakfast, for example; it was french toast with strawberries and blueberries inside, dipped in sugar and topped with both syrup and whipped cream, with a warm side of carrot and corn cubes. I also had a glass of orange juice, the classic breakfast drink, to wash it all down.

It was _amazing_.

"Mrs. Mayer," I said through a mouthful of french toast, "this is incredible."

She smiled. "Thank you, Evan."

 _No, thank you for providing this deliciousness_ , my heart sang as I savored the taste.

Now, I'm not saying my own mom wasn't a good cook. She was good in her own right, but she had nothing on Petra Mayer. Petra's dishes tasted so good I wondered why she hadn't tried to get on some kind of cooking show yet. Hell, forget her nursing career, she could open up a whole restaurant and instantly become the talk of the _country_!

We were eating in the living room, on the couches: Petra, Sofia and I. Stefan had left early, saying that he'd been given some extra hours on the floor. We watched the news, although I didn't really pay attention all that well. I couldn't understand what was being said, after all. I was more focused on my food and how _scrumptious_ it was.

" _Scheiss_ ," Sofia suddenly cursed sharply, eyes wide as she looked at the TV. I didn't need to know German to understand it was a swear of some kind.

"Sofia!" her mom chided, though she stared at the screen with a worried frown.

Sofia winced apologetically at Petra, but turned back to the news. Curious as to what had drawn that reaction from her, I focused more closely on it as well. The footage appeared to be live, and it was playing a scene from what looked like Himmelstein's branch of the Deustche Bank. A male and female reporter had joined forces to talk about something, and as I watched with confusion, gunshots echoed from the TV.

My eyes widened. "What's going on?" I asked worriedly.

Sofia swallowed. "A local supervillain appeared at the bank. He calls himself Eickhorn, and he has gravity-based powers that enable him to change the gravitational attraction of things he touches. According to the reporters, he's currently trying to break into a vault filled with money. The police are trying to shoot him, but he's been putting up too good of a fight."

"It's his sixth attack in the past two months," Petra said darkly. "Three other banks in the local area, three in the next closest city."

Whoa. "How much has he stolen?"

Sofia frowned. "In U.S. dollars… um…" She screwed her eyes up as though doing some quick mental math. "Nearly ten million in total."

 _Ten million dollars?_ I choked at the thought of so much money. "Hold on," I said, blinking, "how come I didn't hear about this before?"

"For a few weeks, his attacks stopped," Petra explained. She sighed and rubbed her head. "This is the first one in nearly a month now. There had been talk that Iron Man was going to come and stop him, so maybe that's why he sto…"

On TV, the female reporter suddenly started speaking rapidly, her tone shifting into something sounding hopeful. I wasn't sure what she was saying, but one part that sounded rather like _Black Widow_ popped out.

"Uh… did she just say Black Widow?"

Sofia leaned forward excitedly. "Yeah! She just snuck into the bank somehow and is fighting Eickhorn! What's she doing in Germany!? This is so cool!" She grinned widely up at her mom and said something happily in German, which earned a flat, though amused look and a retort in a deadpan. Sofia pouted at the TV screen while Petra giggled at her daughter's antics.

I gulped, staring at the TV. What the fuck was Black Widow doing here…?

Oh.

Oh fuck.

She was looking for me, wasn't she? I bet S.H.I.E.L.D. caught wind of whatever energy readings were given off by my transportation to this crazy universe (and then while she was here, she must've heard about Eickhorn's bank attack). I mean, after all, I'm sure whatever brought me here was an Infinity Stone. And the kind of energy needed to reach across dimensions and bring someone to another universe? I was _sure_ it had to be a huge amount.

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

I really needed to lay low now.

A minute or two more passed, with apparently no new reports being made, but then the male reporter started chattering animatedly, and the camera zoomed in past a line of police blocking the entrance to and exit from the bank front doors. Something appeared to be flying out the bank. I squinted, trying to make out what it was. Whatever it was, it was red and blackish.

The next second, the thing crashed through the front doors, and I could see that it wasn't an object, but a man. He wore a deep red hood that also served as a cape, and had black gloves and boots. Underneath the hood, a black latex mask covered his face except for his eyes and mouth. His main suit was gray with white lines accentuating it, and he had a black belt separating the top half of the suit from the bottom half. It looked like an old eighty's supervillain suit.

"Someone's a fan of the old comics," I muttered, raising an eyebrow. I had to admit, it looked badass, especially since Eickhorn was currently dodging bullets by _flying in midair._ "And okay, how the hell is he flying?"

Sofia shrugged. "Nobody's really sure, but I have a theory that he uses his power on himself to decrease his gravitational attraction to the earth, then increases his attraction to things in the direction he wants to move." Sofia liked to study science. She'd told me once that she wanted to study in America like her mom.

I blinked. "...That defies the laws of physics so badly," I deadpanned.

"Have you ever even heard of any of the battles Captain America used to fight?" Sofia deadpanned at me. "His shield fucks with physics _so_ bad."

"...Fair 'nuff."

On screen, Eickhorn's blood red cape fluttered in the wind as he hovered about six feet above the ground. He continued skirting around, bullets barely missing him, and then when the police had to pause to reload, he shot off into the distance. A moment later, a redheaded woman in a black bodysuit―Black Widow―charged out, an annoyed frown on her face. She eyed the police, who nervously looked at each other, clearly unsure what to do in the presence of the S.H.I.E.L.D. agent, and then the Scarlett Johansson lookalike ran off after Eickhorn as the cameras tracked her.

"Looks like she stopped Eickhorn from breaking into the vault," Sofia translated as some pretty badly beat-up police came out from the bank and the reporters interviewed them. A few of the cops had bloody noses, and most of them tenderly held their arms or were limping.

"That's… good," I said weakly, still shaken from the realization that S.H.I.E.L.D. was already so hot on my trail. As well as the fact that maybe now that Eickhorn had fled the scene of his attempted crime, she could resume her investigation into me.

Petra glanced at me and blinked worriedly. "Are you okay?" she asked kindly, putting a hand on my forehead. "You look pale. You're not sick, are you?"

"No," I said, a picture of Natasha Romanoff leaping through my bedroom window and dragging me off for S.H.I.E.L.D. questioning running through my mind. "I'm okay. I just, ah, need to rest. Uh, work's been kinda exhausting." Not even that much of a lie, honestly… Work at the steel plant was the most tiring thing I'd ever done. Before this, I'd only ever worked at McDonald's and then Circle K. I'd never done strenuous labor before.

Petra's eyes softened. "Ah, I see. Go rest up in your room, then. You have the day off, right?"

"Right."

I nodded and rushed upstairs, leaving Sofia to frown in my wake.

~o~

"What the fuck, what the fuck, what am I gonna do!?" I cried hoarsely, latching onto a clone of mine and shaking his shoulders desperately. "S.H.I.E.L.D.'s gonna find out about me really quickly! I mean, fuck, dude, this is a superspy agency we're talking about!"

The clone sighed. "Whoa, boss. Calm down. We can't think things out rationally unless you calm down."

"I CAN'T CALM DOWN!" I barked, my voice cracking a little. "I don't want anything to do with an organization with Neo-Nazis crawling around in its shadows! But Black Widow could bring me right to the lion's den!"

A clone to my right paused, horror dawning on him. "Oh shit. Dude, that's right. _HYDRA_ 's still a part of shield."

"Oh, _shit_ ," several other of my clones gulped in unison. There were five Other Me's altogether here that I'd made to freak out with.

Quiet reigned for a few moments.

"...Do you think Black Widow would still be trying to track us down with that Eickhorn guy on the loose?" the third of my clones spoke up. "I mean, since he's still a threat to the public and shit, she'd focus on him first, right?"

My first clone thought about this. "Uh, you don't think that he's why she hasn't found us yet, do you guys?"

"It's… possible?" my fifth lookalike ventured.

"Natasha Romanoff getting sidetracked?" I said skeptically. "Doesn't sound like her."

"Maybe Tony Stark found out she was coming here and gave her a heads-up about Eickhorn," my fourth clone suggested. "And she decided an active supervillain was of higher importance than someone whose affiliation is unknown."

A chorus of agreement rang out among my clones. I frowned.

"But… I dunno, I don't think―"

"Boss," my second Other Me said flatly. "There's already a story out on the internet and on TV about you. It's clearly a lie to anyone who picked up any unusual energy readings around here, which, let's be honest, it's S.H.I.E.L.D.―they definitely have. That kinda shit, then an American amnesiac happens to just pop out in the same place? Come on, boss, it'd be pretty obvious to anyone on S.H.I.E.L.D.'s level that the two are connected. Ol' BW _has_ to know about us. And if she hasn't acted yet, it has to be because something else caught her attention."

"...Fair point?" I conceded weakly, unsure. "I dunno. Maybe."

"Let's stay here for a bit," the third clone offered. "Wait to see her next move. We can have one of us clones on Widow Watch. You know, transform us into something small and inconspicuous, keep an eye out to see if she's coming. Then if we see her coming, warn you so you can escape."

I licked my too-dry lips and fiddled with my fingers. "Um. I guess? I dunno. God, I wish I were smarter."

"In the meantime," he continued, "let's just do something like, I dunno, make a bunch of clones, send 'em out, and get a bunch of different jobs at once to make tons of money so we can have something to fall back on when BW picks back up on us."

I stared. "That's… actually really smart."

He preened. "Thanks, I usually am."

I rolled my eyes. "Okay. So. If we're gonna do this, I think it'd be helpful to know what exactly my powers entail. You clones already know what I can do, right?"

"Yeah," clone numero two said. "So, to start off. First of all, you have a special energy residual from the… I think Infinity Stone?... that brought you over here. It's what makes us clones. You have enough 'clone energy' to make about 150 clones. Imbuing a clone with more clone energy than is required to form the shape you want gives the clone extra strength. As you're already aware, you can also manipulate the clone energy to take the form of whatever else you want it to."

"And what kind of limitations do I have?" I asked.

The fifth clone stepped up to answer. "There's no time limit to how long we can remain in the forms you shape us to, or limit to the distance you can send us from you. However, if you faint or fall unconscious for any reason, any clone made will revert back to clone energy and return to you. If a clone takes several solid hits, it'll pop and return to you. And after a clone is used and returns to you, it takes about half an hour for that energy to be able to be used again. It's a kind of cool-down effect."

"Okay, okay." I nodded along as I filed all of this information in my brain. "Anything else?"

The clones frowned at each other in thought.

"Um… oh!" number one said suddenly. "Yeah. While you can retain our memories, like you experienced last night…"

We collectively blushed as the thought of… _things_ ran through our memory.

"...If too many clones return their memories to you at once, you black out from the strain," he concluded weakly. "At about eighty clones' memories is when it's too much. Anything after that, you black out for an increasing amount of time."

"And you _can_ push the amount of clones you can make past 150," added the second clone, "but it draws heavily on your own body's energy and gets really damaging and dangerous. Like, life-threateningly dangerous."

I swallowed. "Gotcha. Don't make over 150 clones, and don't summon them all back at the same time."

The clones all nodded seriously. A few moments passed.

"...It's really a lot like having Kage Bunshin and Henge at the same time," my fourth clone realized.

We all blinked and chorused agreement.

I nervously cracked my knuckles. "Alright, then I guess… now that I know the full extent of my powers... let's start getting lots of jobs."

~o~

After that impromptu meeting of the Clone Round Table, I took out a copy of a German dictionary Stefan had bought me, made about 40 clones of smaller sizes so that we could all fit in the same room, and made 40 copies of the dictionary using other clones. Then we all just spent a few hours studying how to read German online. When I felt like we'd done enough studying, I concentrated on the energy I could feel from them, and summoned them all back to me, and…

Yikes, was that a weird feeling! Eighty different peoples' memory hardwired itself into my head at once, sending me reeling like a punch to the gut. My head felt _really_ dizzy and fuzzy, and very quickly I felt sickly hot. Really, I just felt like utter crap. My brain worked overtime to sort out all of the memory, but in the end, I supposed it was worth it, because when I cracked open a book I stole from Sofia's room, I could actually understand it far better than I ever would've been able to before.

Yeah, I thought, grinning. I could definitely take advantage of this ability.

...I still felt a strong need for a power nap, though, and ended up sleeping through lunch.

I spent the rest of the day studying German on my own, practicing how to speak it as well as read it. I even got Sofia to help teach me, dragging her away from her knitting hobby to do so.

Let me tell you what, speaking German was a hell of a lot harder than _reading_ it.

Maybe that was just because I hadn't had forty clones helping me study though.

And that was kind of how the next couple weeks went. I kept studying how to speak and read German, and using my clones to help out with that. By the time about fifteen days had passed, I had learned enough of it to at least understand what was being said to me and pass for a native speaker so long as I mostly kept quiet.

Luckily, the sentries I posted on Widow Watch didn't report a thing. At the same time, one or two more encounters between Romanoff and Eickhorn played on the news here and there. There was a fight at the town hall, and a fight at a movie theater. It seemed that my clones had guessed correctly. For now, the Amber Room-made superspy wasn't focused on me. And I guess Eickhorn was a slippery goon; both instances they fought after the bank, he always seemed to be able to slip away from her. And apparently, she was having trouble cracking down on his real identity.

That was fine by me.

I engaged stage 2 of my Black Widow contingency plan.

I made around 50 different clones and sent them all out to gather jobs in either Himmelstein or surrounding communities. Within a week, a quarter of them found work. Work in gas stations, washing dishes in restaurants, other plants, on farms. Anywhere that was hiring workers who were happy to work for less than others, basically. I didn't bother setting up bank accounts with them, I just had them pretend to be homeless people who needed the money in cash form. Then, when their first paychecks rolled around, I had the ones within reasonable distance to the Mayer estate bring the money directly to me. The others I had buy suitcases, stuff the paychecks into said suitcases, turn into dogs, and bury it in a location that they'd remember.

Luckily, my clones, being made of clone energy, didn't need food or water or anything to function, and could simply remain out there guarding and making money.

Among the various jobs I had and paychecks I brought home two weeks after the beginning of stage 2, I was already making some Pretty Damn Good Moolah™. My pay rate for my various jobs was around eight dollars an hour, maybe a few dollars more or a bit less depending on the job, and the clones worked around 30 hours a week. They were part-time employees, after all. With that in mind, and converting from euros to dollars, I made about $240 per clone each week. Then multiplying that by the 14 clones with current jobs, our total pay equaled out to somewhere within $3,000-$3,500. _Per week_. I wasn't entirely sure on the specifics.

Either way, it was a pretty solid amount.

Allow me to repeat that: $3,000-$3,500 each week. From _minimum wage jobs_.

Yeah.

It was _kind of insane_.

I could _definitely_ get used to the whole clone powers thing. Unfortunately, though, a hitch in the road came three weeks after I started raking in _all_ of the dough.

As I was using some of my clones to continue to study German, the door opened.

And before I had time to summon my clones back, Sofia poked her blonde head around the door.

"Yo, Evan, dinner's…" She paused and stared with huge, round eyes. "...Whyyyyyyyy are there seven of you?"

Silence reigned.

"...Fuck," my clones and I all gulped.


	4. In Which Sofia is Amazing

Chapter 4: In Which Sofia is Amazing

My clones and I paled.

"Uh… I don't know what you're talking about," I said quickly, trying to sound as confused as I could. I cracked my knuckles unconsciously and licked my dry lips.

Sofia stared flatly. "Evan, you're a terrible liar. You look like a deer caught in the headlights."

...It was worth a shot.

"What do we do, boss?" one of my clones hissed, looking just as surprised and worried as I felt.

"I _knew_ we should've put a sentry on the door," another mumbled.

I glared at him indignantly. "People in this house usually knock! It ain't my fault I expected consistency! And wait, _why didn't you say we should've earlier_?"

"I thought you had a plan!"

"I've been worrying my ass off about Black Widow!" I barked, gaping at him. "I haven't even had _time_ to worry about anything else! You guys are supposed to be my backup here; you should've said something!"

"Yeah, well… fuck you!"

"Fuck _you_!"

My clones and I began squabbling in earnest, Sofia's eye twitching.

" _Hello_!" she said loudly at last, frowning. "I'm still here. And very confused! I'd really like to know what's going on!"

We all froze and looked at each other. My mouth opened a little and then closed, as I tried and failed to think of an excuse or denial she could accept. But I was panicking and maybe not thinking as clearly as I might have been under normal circumstances, so I couldn't really think of anything. Apparently, neither could my clones, judging by the looks on their faces.

"Um," one of my clones said, "we… are… ah..."

"Clooooones?" another finished uncertainly, blinking.

Everyone in the room stared at him.

"...You're clones," Sofia repeated flatly, folding her arms and raising her eyebrow. "Like, real, living clones. _Clones_."

"...Um, maybe?" yet another mumbled, scratching the side of his head. Sofia gazed at him piercingly. "Well, although I don't really know if you could call us _alive_ … Half-living, maybe? Uhhh…"

"We are _so_ unprepared for this," I whimpered, dragging my palms down my face.

Sofia raised her eyebrow skeptically. "Okay. Prove it all to me."

I deflated and let out a deep sigh. I'd already fucked up enough just letting her see the clones, so I might as well go for broke. Groaning, I nodded weakly and relented. I imagined the clones returning to me, and they turned into light blue energy that flowed back into my body. Sofia blinked rapidly at that. She opened her mouth, but before she could say anything, I sighed again and made several more clones. More light blue energy pushed out of my body and formed about three clones that stood beside me.

Sofia's jaw dropped a little. "...Hooow?"

"I have no idea," I deadpanned. "The clones say it's some kind of residual energy left inside me from whatever pulled me from my world into this one."

"World?" Sofia said, looking a little dizzy. "Hold on, _world_? I thought… I thought you were just from a different _time_ ―"

Oh. That's right, I hadn't mentioned that to the Mayers yet. Whoops. Beside me, the clones facepalmed. I scratched the side of my head. "Uh. Yeah. I guess I forgot to mention that, huh?"

Sofia opened her mouth, closed it, and then shook her head. "You have a _lot_ of explaining to do."

"Okay, okay, I'll tell you everything, but can we keep this from your parents?" I asked hurriedly. "I'm a bit afraid that Black Widow's looking for me, and I _really_ would like to keep my powers as secret as possible so that they have as little risk of leaking out as I can ensure."

Sofia chewed her lower lip. "Okay. I… I'm still not _entirely_ convinced I haven't had some bad mushrooms or something, but…" She took a deep breath and nodded. "Okay. After dinner, tell me everything, and I promise I won't tell mom or dad. Or anyone else."

"Deal," I said.

She hesitated a little, then ducked out of the room.

I locked eyes with the clones, all of them as dumbfounded as me. "Well, uh," I stammered, "that happened?"

The clones facepalmed.

~o~

"So, yeah," I mumbled, fidgeting as Sofia sat at the desk while I sat on my bed.

It was after dinner, which had been a delicious chicken and beef noodle soup, and it was getting dark outside. A soft yellow-orange glow lit up the room from a lamp that sat on my desk and appeared to have been handcrafted by Sofia when she'd been a kid. It had a white lampshade with little multi-colored dinosaurs stamped onto it. I could imagine a seven-year-old blonde tyke happily trying to construct the device, pulling along Petra and Stefan for help. It was a cute mental image, but didn't really help me relax any.

"Yeah," Sofia said, swallowing. She stared from one of my clones, who I hadn't dispelled yet, to the next. "You have clone powers. And you're not just from another time but another _world_."

"That's about right." I sighed and rubbed my forehead.

"I guess to start things off… How do you know this isn't your world?"

I ran my tongue along the roof of my mouth. "That's… well. In my world, we… don't have any kind of superheroes or supervillains or vibranium or anything like that. It's a completely normal world. We're a lot less advanced than this world, too, because there's no Starks. And, uh… in my world… Iron Man is a comic book superhero."

Sofia stared wide-eyed. "Wait. You mean, our Iron Man―"

"Yup. Tony Stark is one of the most popular superheroes in my world, right alongside the Hulk, Black Widow, and good ol' Captain America. Thor, too." I tapped my foot unconsciously. "They all exist in the same comic book universe. But what really shocked me was what they _look_ like. Because in my world, a series of movies were made about all of them, as well as some others who haven't shown up yet. It was called the Marvel Cinematic Universe."

"So, this world exists in your world as a series of _movies_!?" Sofia exclaimed.

"Yup," I confirmed, nodding. "Tony Stark is played by an actor named Robert Downey Jr., who as far as I've been able to see, doesn't exist in this world. Steve Rogers is played by Chris Evans, Bruce Banner by Mark Ruffalo, Thor by Chris Hemsworth, and finally, Black Widow is played by Scarlett Johansson. The original comics that the movies were based off of were created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby."

"Jack Kirby…" the blonde said, frowning. "I think I've heard his name before. I think he did some work on DC Comics."

I raised my eyebrow. "Wait, really? That's… kinda interesting, actually. In my world, DC Comics was kinda neck-and-neck with the comic book company that created the Iron Man, Hulk, Captain America, and Black Widow comics, Marvel, and Jack Kirby worked for Marvel instead of DC."

"We don't have Marvel here," Sofia said, scratching her chin at that thought. I'd already known _that_ , having looked it up prior and getting zero search results.

"Yeah. Anyway… in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, there are these things called _Infinity Stones_. There's six of them, and they were here from before the Big Bang. They hold the ability to control various different things in the world. There's the Reality Stone, the Mind Stone, the Time Stone, the Power Stone, and the Space Stone."

"Okay," Sofia said skeptically, raising her eyebrow. "Why are you telling me this?"

"I was getting there," I huffed. "My best guess is that I arrived here because of something involving the Space Stone. As you'd imagine, it is able to control space, so it'd probably be capable of opening portals across universes and grabbing me from mine."

"So… can't you just get the stone and get back home?" she asked, tilting her head.

I winced. "Uh… problem with that: It's in S.H.I.E.L.D. The biggest secret superspy organization in the U.S. government. At least, if my memory's correct."

"Ah."

"Yeah."

We sat there awkwardly for a moment. She scratched her cheek. "So… in an effort to change the topic, what exactly can you do with your clones? What do your powers entail?" I blinked at how Sofia's eyes suddenly sparkled with excitement, but it made sense, honestly. She did _love_ science.

I launched into an explanation of my powers while Sofia listened intently. Her eyes widened with more and more of an excited spark as I did so. When I was done, she was practically giddy. "Oh my god, you actually have _superpowers_!" she gushed in an awed tone. "I can't believe it! Are you going to be a superhero? I mean, come on, you gotta be, right?"

I gawked at her. "You're kidding, right? What's a normal guy like me going to be able to do against guys on the level of _Iron Man_ and _the fucking Hulk_? I mean, sure… theoretically, if I imbued a single clone with the energy of 150 of them, I'd be sitting at round about the same strength as the Hulk, but it'd still go out in a few good hits, and besides, I know absolutely nothing about fighting!"

"But you _could_!" the cute German girl babbled eagerly, practically bouncing. "I mean, it's only been two weeks since you really started studying German, and you're already almost completely fluent now, right? I bet your brain's adapted to your ability to have eidetic memory! You could watch a bunch of martial art tutorial videos, learn how to fight using your fights, using weapons! You could have your clones turn _into_ weapons so that you wouldn't even need to buy any! There's so many possibilities!"

I hesitated, licking my dry lips. With a gulp, I asked, "You, uh, really think so?"

"Dude, _yes_!" Sofia emphasized. "Clone powers are _overpowered_. And especially since you have the ability to transform them. Evan, the world _needs_ you."

"I-I dunno," I stammered, feeling my heart flutter a little at the idea. "I mean, there are some _scary_ strong enemies in store. And I don't really wanna get involved and potentially fuck everything up for the future. The baseline future is already pretty bad enough, although it's pretty much unanimously theorized that there's going to be some kinda time travel quantum realm bullshit shenanigans to undo it all…"

Sofia blinked, clearly not following.

"Half the world becomes dustpan food," I said with a shaky breath. "And the guy who caused that is physically strong enough to go toe to toe with the Hulk and _beat his green ass to the ground_."

"Oh," said Sofia in a small voice. She paled. "That… you're not joking about that?"

My skin felt clammy just thinking about it being a very, very, very strong possibility for my future. "I wish I was, Sofia. But I'm not."

We were silent for a few minutes as we pondered that depressing thought.

Then Sofia fixed her gaze on me firmly, blue eyes blazing. "Then that's even more reason you should become a hero."

I blinked up in surprise. "Eh?"

"You have these powers," she insisted. "You have this knowledge of the future. You can make things _better_. You can make it so that half-the-world-becomes-dustpan-food event never happens in the first place."

I sat up shakily. "Sofia, no. No. That's _not possible_. One of the future heroes, a guy named Doctor Strange, was able to _see fourteen million_ different possible futures for the battle against Thanos, the man who turns half the world to literal dust. Do you know how many versions of that the heroes won in? _One version_ , Sofia. One version."

Her mouth had started to open to protest, but at that revelation, it snapped shut again and her eyes widened.

"Only one in fourteen million…?" she breathed in horror.

I nodded grimly. "That's how strong Thanos is. A guy who can take on the Hulk without even a sweat gathers all six Infinity Stones. And the Earth's mightiest superheroes barely stand a _fraction_ of a chance at beating him."

Sofia's mouth opened and closed wordlessly.

"That's what we're up against," I said, hands shaking. "That's what _I'd_ be up against. If I go out on the front lines, there's no way I wouldn't eventually have to face him. And like I told you, if enough of my clones got decimated at once, I'd black out, and if I gave the enemy _that_ much of an opening…"

We were both silent again.

"It's better if I stay laying low," I added after a while. "At least if I do that and manage to avoid Black Widow, I have a 50/50 chance of actually surviving this. But if I head out to the front lines…"

"You could save so many more lives," Sofia said suddenly, gaze unwavering. "You could learn, train. Get stronger. Get to that kind of level. With your powers… you could do it."

I swallowed. "I… I dunno."

She placed a firm hand on my shoulder. "I'll do whatever I can to help, Evan. I'll create your suits, come up with stuff for you to use. I'll be your girl-in-the-chair!"

My jaw slackened. "You'd… you know if it was found out you were helping me, you'd be put in danger, too, right?"

She winked. "I can take care of myself."

"Do you…" I hesitated some more, uncertain. "Do you really think I'd… be a good superhero?"

"You'd be great," Sofia assured me with a smile.

"Do you really think I wouldn't screw things up?"

"You got me, don't you?" she laughed, joking.

I cracked a grin. "...I dunno. Maybe. Maybe I'll try it out. I just… it's kinda terrifying. I always wanted to be a superhero when I was a kid, you know?" I admitted. "But now…"

"Well, hey, we got our own supervillain right here in town," Sofia pointed out. "And you know, as you are right now, you're not going to be able to hide from Black Widow for long. She'll catch up to you eventually, if she's as professional as you say she is."

I blinked. "Hold on, you don't actually know much about her?"

"Nope. There's mostly just rumors about her. She makes the papers sometimes and we know her name and stuff, and there's a lot of theories about her, but all we really know is that she shows up sometimes when there's something big going down. Kinda like the good version of those creepy Winter Soldier rumors that float around on the darker corners of the 'Net, except actually confirmed instead of just on conspiracy theory level." She frowned in thought. "Actually, that fight from a while back was the first live footage we've had of her."

Huh. Well, that was a surprise, although in hindsight, it really shouldn't have been. Ol' Romanoff _was_ the secret-secret-hush-hush type.

"So, then," Sofia said, crossing her arms under her chest. "Are you going to be a superhero, or are you going to continue to try to live like this?"

I pursed my lips as I considered the options.

"I'll…" I hesitated, looked aside awkwardly, then winced. "I'll think about it."

She smiled softly. "Hey. I know you're scared, but you won't have to do it alone, alright? You'll have me here."

"...Thanks," I said sincerely, smiling as well. Sofia really was great.

She hugged me. "Anytime, Evan." My heart hammered in my chest, both from the thought of being a superhero and therefore jumping right into the heart of all the danger and from being in such close proximity with a very cute girl. "Hey, let me know when you decide, okay? I'll be designing your costume."

"...Okay." I nodded. "I'll let you know."

"Great. Well, then, my head is _filled_ with ideas and I need to go draw some of them out! I'll be in my room if you need me."

And with that, she released me and ducked out the door.

I sat on my bed, thinking.

Was this something I wanted? Was this something I really could do? Could someone like me, just a normal almost-20-year-old from Ohio who'd gotten in over his head really be a superhero? Could I actually make a difference? I actually felt like it could be a possibility now. But still… I shivered at the thought of Thanos.

Doubts and worried thoughts about what the future might hold depending on what I chose remained stewing in my mind for the rest of the evening.


End file.
